Re: Engine Oil
 

For the oils without detergents, how often are you supposed to change them?

Re: Engine Oil
 

I always wondered how long everyone here goes on their oil changes.

Now I know, and I must say, my car is babied by comparison to some of your guys' cars.

I change my IS300 every 4-5k with Valvoline SynPower and a Mobil 1 filter.

and my old GSX was changed every.... I dunno, 2 months of so since I was always tearing it back apart. The lowest that would get changed with was Valvoline Durablend. Eventually changed it to Mobil 1 5-40/0-40. Totally got rid of my lifter tick. Best thing I ever did to that engine.

I stopped using any form of conventional back in my GSX days. I don't believe in conventional anymore. The science is there. Synthetics for life. But I don't believe in running synthetics past 5k. Mostly due to my mistrust for filters. I've seen too many of the new internal filters come through my shop that have failed and were letting dirty oil flow through without filtration.

Also, I seen something around here about color. Black... like pure black... is not good. Your filter should keep it from being pure black. Dark yes, Black, no. If your oil is pure freaking black change it or change your filter.

I know, I know. Modern detergent oils turn dark because they are carrying the sludge and debris from operation.... But it still shouldn't be BLACK black. Chances are your filter failed awhile back at that point.

Re: Engine Oil
 

3k miles. Thats were the old wives tale came from was those oils.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Ahh okay Thanks. Is there really any advantage to using non-detergent oil? it seems like the stuff with it is healthier for the engine, and lasts longer. :rock2:

Re: Engine Oil
 

Castrol syntec, and audi recommends 10k oil change intervals. I got usually about 6 since the cars modified.

Non Synthetic oil, id go 4k easy.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Hmm..read this whole thread and it seems people are using Amsoil and M1 either the 10w30 or the 10w40. Good read by the way. I have a few questions though;

(1) Does it matter which oil (amsoil, m1, pennzoil, valvoline...all synthetic of coarse) I use for the mods I have and will it effect performance?
(2) I was told not to really change from (x brand) to (x brand) because of the different "ingrediants" they use for each oil...is this true? Is that why when a few of us change to different oils, there's suddenly an issue?

In my personal experience, I've been using M1 10w30 since I got the car. I've literally changed the oil RIGHT under the 3000 mile mark every time with the NAPA gold oil filters. My head currently has a leaky valve, so I'm guessing that is why the car loves to eat 1-1.5 quarts every 1500 miles. Haven't had any issues with the engine though. Head still looks pretty spotless. I will post pictures of the head soon once I get to work.

Re: Engine Oil
 

No idea what your mods are so can't answer that.



No idea what sudden issues you are referring to as I've never experienced these sudden issues you speak of, and i use different oil brands regularly (I buy what ever is on sale). So again can't answer that.

Re: Engine Oil
 

lol..early morning ftl.

as for my mods; e316g, 550s, 190 pump, 2g mani, fmic, 3" exhaust system, ported o2/2g mani, dsmlink v2(untuned still! :( ). The car has been doing fine for the past 3 years so I'm pretty satisfied with m1 10w30. Haven't driven the car since winter came though.

As for the issues for your main car and not a DD, I was reading other posts on here saying that when they switched oils, one of the members here got a spun bearing, Goodhart mentioned one of the Supra guys (mk3) getting the same thing. I haven't gotten any issues because I haven't switched brands of oil just because of the different "ingrediants" x-brand has compared to the other x-brand. As for the DD, I too buy what ever is on sale :D

Re: Engine Oil
 

1. No. In the real world any major brand synthetic (or conventional) oil is going to perform perfectly fine within reasonable oil change intervals. I use Mobil 1 because it's factory-fill on Evos and cheap at Walmart.
2. Personal preference; I believe in picking something and sticking with it, but Brandon is the exact opposite.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Fixed that for ya :)

Re: Engine Oil
 

Ive heard Shane say numerous times that Mobile one is too thin and ruins bearings. For normal cars that are more reserved im sure its fine, but highly modified cars have issues?

Re: Engine Oil
 

I don't know that it's too thin so much as people making north of 400whp are not using thicker oil. More power requires more protection any way you look at it.

Re: Engine Oil
 

I don't buy his thinking on that. Plenty of high-power track Subarus down here run Mobil 1 5W-30. Subarus do have oil over-heating issues though which is going to be magnified while sitting stationary on the dyno; that will wreck a bearing real quick under high-load no matter what brand of oil you're running.

Re: Engine Oil
 

I've seen a lot of subaru's with spun bearings on Shane's dyno that have used mobil 1.

I've always used Mobil 1 10w30 in my dsm, however I think I'm going to change to something new this year. If I blow up, I'll let you guys know. haha

Re: Engine Oil
 

There is a reason they switched to detergent oils. That reason is because non-detergent oils don't clean the sludge out of your engine. Sludge = bad, we all know this. For a modern engine I would recommend sticking with detergent oils.

This doesn't really matter. Additives are all relatively the same. Obviously some are higher quality, or are a lot more robust then others. But additives are only making up 20% of your oils composition. It's the other 80% you need to worry about, such as paraffin levels, quality of the refining, etc. Penzoil for instance is IMO the worst oil out there, especially at the conventional level. Their paraffin content is too high and leads to massive sludge.

I'm in agreeance with matt on this one peter. I'd say its more the fault of not going thick enough, like uping to a 5w40 or 10w40. Altho FP did show that just by switching to Mobil 1 they managed to scorch a thrust bearing.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Im just stating what Ive heard, and wanted Shane to chime in with his thoughts. I would agree oil weight def matters.

Ill stick with castrol though, to each their own.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Shane isn't the first person to say that either. I've heard that same comment quite a bit, and with all the failures I've seen with people running it, I will personally never run it. But to each their own :)

Re: Engine Oil
 

Odd how it's only FP turbos failing while all the OEM bearing turbos are holding up just fine without fancy oil feed lines and expensive oils ;)

If you compare the wear protection specs of Mobil 1 5W-30 vs. Amsoil's you'll notice they are almost identical. The reason you see more Mobil 1 engines blowing up is because more people run it, simple statistics.

Re: Engine Oil
 

If we are comparing wear protection then Mobil 1 loses hard. Castrol Syntec has 8 times advertised wear protection, while my boys at Valvoline market 4 times the protection (supposedly upwards of 8, but they chose the lowest denominator for marketing purposes, dont wanna get sued now)

Back in the day M1 was pretty much king shit, now-a-days there are far better alternatives. M1 just has the name going for them. Makes the dumb majority of car buyers feel special.

Re: Engine Oil
 

LOL @ everyone claiming they have billion times more wear protection. Marketing hype at it's finest. The 3/4 ball wear tests mean nothing, it's a test that was designed for testing gear oil, not engine oil.

(sorry in advance for the goofy formatting, I bolded M1 numbers to make it a bit easier to read)

Mobil 1 10W-30 Amsoil XL 10W-30
Viscosity @ 100ºC: 10.7 10.5
Viscosity, @ 40ºC: 65.3 63.6
Viscosity Index: 154 155
HTHS Viscosity: 3.26 3.2
Pour Point, ºC: -39 -40
Flash Point, ºC: 230 232

When you compare these actual technical specs (i.e. not laboratory tests paid for by Amsoil) you can see how nearly identical these oils are.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Marketing at its finest, yet you are comparing two companies that basically live off their name, one of which wasn't even able to get the proper certifications for half of its product line. Just saying.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Coming from the guy who works at a competing oil change shop?

Re: Engine Oil
 

Say what you want. But any company that fakes an API seal because they can't actually get one shouldn't be given a seat at the table in this discussion. GTFO Amsoil.

Also, yes I do realize I am coming from a competitor stand point, however on the quick lube side we are not in any real competition with Mobil 1 up here. We are more worried about making Jiffy Lube and Pennzoil look like shit bags.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Where the F did this 3000 mile mark come from? i remember seeing multiple places that the oil doesnt reach its full potential until around 4000 miles. then it starts to drop. Hence why most car manufactureres now recommend 5000 mile changes.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Majority of what I've heard over on BITOG about Pennzoil Platinum Synthetic oils is that it's supposidely pretty decent.

Re: Engine Oil
 

If someones bored, It would be fun to see what those blackwater tests show for different oils.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Blackstone :)

Stop thinking about war/politics.

Re: Engine Oil
 

I get my oil tested at watergate every 6 months.

Re: Engine Oil
 

I wish they had zinc/phos specs listed for Castrol Syntec 10w-40 since that's what I put in last May on the dyno. I've only driven the car a couple thousand miles since then, I'll probably change it again in spring just for giggles. I think 20w-50 might be a bit much for my car, though according to FP I have a race engine since I make 100bhp/liter lol.

Re: Engine Oil
 

They actually said anything that makes 100hp per piston is in race engine territory.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Well dang, you're right. Please ignore my misquote, I won't be making anywhere close to 800hp ever.

I just read a lot on ls1tech about this same subject, interesting info. Anyway, I think it probably doesn't matter for me since I'm not exactly pushing the limits, though I have noticed I starting using a bit of oil after switching from M1 to Syntec.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Going by these statistics you could claim a certain olive oil was "oh so similar" as well, even though I'm sure some terrible things would happen if you ran that for a second.

If Mobile 1 is so awesome, why do a large amount of reputible builders warn people to stay away from it? Using the "factory fill" excuse is old, Would you use an OEM swaybar over a Whiteline because it was on it from the factory? or would you go with a higher quality product?

Also, why does FP recommend a different oil for use in their turbos then the stock ones? Idk, different bearings. Higher load. The fact that a high performance part may require something different? I have non-oem bearings throughout my entire engine, and that coupled with my cars performance means that I almost have to use a heaver and higher quality oil. It's the same theory. I'm guessing if you call up PTE or Garrett, and ask them "M1 vs Amsoil XP or Dominator" the answer will be the same everytime.

Re: Engine Oil
 

I use valvoline or rotella. i can't believe u guys get your oil tested for cars you barely keep for a few years.

Re: Engine Oil
 

This.... This is one of those retarded notions I deal with daily. It goes along with "An airfilter doesnt even start to work till it's 80% clogged"

How can something that starts to shear and break down the moment the engine starts after the oil change come into its "full potential" after 3000 miles?

Thats like saying your food isnt awesome until you have chewed it for 5 mins, spit it back out then ate it again.

Or, your engines compression is at its max until 100,000 miles, after it has had a chance to build up sludge and other shit in it for awhile.


And then to answer the question instead of belittling tom....
I do BELIEVE it came from the fact that when non-detergent oils break down there is nothing to clean up the sludge, so to keep sludge to a minimum it was recommended to get it out at 3k miles before it reaches the break down point where large amounts of sludge develop. Remember, this was on technology that is decades old and where conventional was king and the only synthetics being used were in airplane engines. This was also when people use to tune their car by ear and backed off 5* after getting a pinging noise. Time to get into the 21st century with this and just give in to the fact that more demanding engines with higher compressions and tighter tolerances need thinner and easier flowing oils that are sludge free. Hence synthetics and changing the oil every 5k or less.

VAG and BMW specs for 10-15k are because Europe is requiring their cars to run longer on the oil so as to reduce pollution overall from used oil. They counteract this with "premium filters" that have a higher capacity for debris, as well as synthetic mediums.

/trying to be smart

Re: Engine Oil
 

More facts less hype please. If I wanted to read an Amsoil brochure I would. Whatever it takes to make yourself feel good about spending extra though. Mobil 1 is the easy scapegoat; for reason why see my comment a few posts back. FP's oil PDF is nothing but a temporary fix to get people off Robert's back just like the o2 housing claim and then the oil line claim was.

LOL @ you for trying to call me out for posting actual technical specs of oil. Find me olive oil that has the same properties as motor oil and I'll put it in my engine.

Re: Engine Oil
 

The only "technical specs" that you gave were viscosity. You wouldn't drink pee instead of water and call them "basically the same" would you?

Amsoil brochure? I was using an example.

There's plenty of facts and tests out there, if you want to swing from the nuts of Mobil 1 thats fine. I'll stick with something that a ass pile of reputible engine builders tell me, along with the tests that plenty of 3rd party people have done. It's not my fault that you're stubborn enough to ignore the actual facts.

Re: Engine Oil
 

"Why are some AMSOIL Synthetic Motor Oils API licensed and some are not?
There are two primary reasons:

1. There are strict phosphorus additive level restrictions placed on API certified oils that would
minimize the full performance and extended oil drain capability of AMSOIL motor oils.
2. The API does NOT allow read-across approvals for synthetic motor oils, and therefore
certification costs become unrealistic.

Phosphorus Restrictions

Full API licensing, or certification, would impose strict phosphorous limitations on AMSOIL motor oils. This limitation is the main reason most AMSOIL motor oils are not API licensed...." (Copyright 2008)

http://www.syntheticwarehouse.com/api_licensing.htm

HAHAHA, Yeah... Go AMSOIL.... At least Mobil 1 can get API certs for their entire line.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Considering the only "properties" you care about is viscosity, here you go. Looks like Olive Oil would be right around SAE 15.

Motor oil SAE 10
Viscosity
[Pa·s] 0.065
[cP=mPa.s]65

Motor oil SAE 40
Viscosity
[Pa·s]0.319
[cP=mPa.s]319

Olive Oil
Viscosity
[Pa·s]0.081
[cP=mPa.s]81

I'll even supply you with the first 5 Quarts, What brand would you prefer?

(obviously not saying it is super similar to motor oil, but the viscosity is extremely similar. There is a lot of things that matter besides viscostiy, which is my basic point.)

Re: Engine Oil
 

Yeah, I dont really care about Amsoil, just using it as an example.

Re: Engine Oil
 

Hahaha, are you kidding me?? Olive oil is barely better than a 10 weight oil, and you are trying to claim victory??? GTFO lol